The invention relates to an apparatus for connecting a variety of surgical instruments to an operating control device.
Disclosed, for example, by U.S. Pat. No. 4,573,468 is a circular stapling device from which the head unit may be removed as a whole. Connecting the head unit to an operating control part on this stapling device is achieved by a complicated bayonet lock. Furthermore, the clincher insertion head needs to be screwed onto/from this known instrument which is a nuisance and time-consuming.
As it reads from U.S. Pat. No. 5,533,361 a head part of the surgical instrument is positively connected by a crimped tube stiffly and non-separably to a shank part of the operating control means. In U.S. Pat. No. 4,606,343 too, it reads that a shank tube of the operating control device and a head part of the surgical instrument are likewise fixedly connected to each other. Replacing any parts of the surgical instrument is thus not provided for.